


Strong Enough

by Ranni



Category: Avengers, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Captivity, Clint Barton Needs a Hug, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Exposure, Gen, Hurt Clint Barton, Hurt Steve Rogers, Hurt Tony Stark, Hurt/Comfort, Protective Clint Barton, Protective Steve Rogers, Protective Tony Stark, Starvation, Steve Rogers Feels, Steve Rogers Needs a Hug, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Tony Stark Is a Good Bro, Tony Stark Needs a Hug
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-18
Updated: 2017-06-18
Packaged: 2018-11-15 16:59:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,899
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11235303
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ranni/pseuds/Ranni
Summary: Steve, Tony, and Clint are held prisoner, but the real danger begins when their captors abandon the prison to let them die in their cells.--or--Man vs man, Man vs self, and Man vs nature, all in the same fic





	Strong Enough

 

* * *

Clint goes to the door of his cell, pulls himself up on the bars to brace with his feet, pulling hard at the locking mechanism with a loud clank. He does it for hours at a time throughout the day. _Clank. Clank. Clank. Clank._

"Damn you, Tweetie," Tony swears. "You are going to drive me crazy. You could pull for a hundred thousand years and you'll _never_ get that door open."

But he doesn't stop. "Either this lock or Clint Barton is gonna break eventually. I know which one I'm rooting for."

"Well, that's just terribly inspiring," Tony says sourly, obviously trying not to smile as he crosses his arms. "My whole goddamn life outlook just changed. You're almost as motivating as Captain Platitude over there."

Steve starts working on the bars near his bed; it's less noisy than what Clint is doing. Tony mutters about inconsiderate neighbors and starts combing every inch of his own cell, running over every rivet and hinge with evaluating fingers.

*******  
"That guy," Tony stage whispers, and Clint nods in agreement. "That one there."

It's one of the guards that tends to them; none of them talk much, as only a few speak English. But this guy, named Konstantin, is the youngest, and looks at them the most, seeming both uncomfortable and guilty. He only appears to know a few English words, but Clint is fluent in Russian and starts working on him persistently, an endless litany of coaxing and urging whenever the man appears. After a few days Clint wears him down, and the young guard finally starts chattering back, casting uneasy glances at Tony and Steve the entire time.

After the guard leaves, Clint sighs, and Tony gestures impatiently. " _Well_??"

"It's about money, what do you _think_?" Clint sounds disgusted, puts his head into hands. "Ugh. So, here's the deal: Cap, they're gonna sell you to whoever will pay the most to cut you up and make their own supersoldiers. They're putting out feelers and governments want to buy you, but a corporation probably will; they have more money." His laugh is bitter, mocking. "And Tony, same for you, kiddo. But they won't chop you to pieces; they'll just make you their tech building slave, so have fun in your coming days of involuntary servitude."

"Hmm, wonderful." Tony frowns. "What about you?"

"They're trying to see if SHIELD will pay for me, but good luck with _that_. Maybe if I still had 20 years of missions ahead of me." He shrugs pragmatically. "It is what it is. So that's bad news, but there's worse news."

"Oh _great_. Hold on, let me get mentally prepared." Tony closes his eyes and pinches his fingers to the bridge of his nose, takes an exaggerated breath. "Okay. I'm ready."

"They're dumb as hell. They have no idea what they are doing. It's only taking as long as it has because they can't figure out where to start. Goddamned _morons_. I mean, if they're going to kill us, they could at least have the courtesy of doing it faster."

"And of feeding us in the meantime," Steve adds.

"Yeah, well, that's on purpose. They want us half dead. Not _all_ dead, mind you. Just enough where we can't get up to hijinks."

"Well, we'll show _them_ ," Tony declares. "Our hijinks are unstoppable!"

"Damn straight." Steve winks at Tony, who smirks back.

*******  
They are given a ration of water daily, but not food. At first the hunger is an annoying gnaw, then an active pain as their stomachs shrink. They grow thin quickly, then gaunt.

After the first week Tony and Clint are given a bowl of oatmeal every other day, but Steve is still given nothing, and he knows it is because their captors rightly guess that Captain America can go without food far longer than his teammates. While Tony looks guilty and hesitant when they are fed, Clint has no pretense of feeling the same, other than casting Steve a quick apologetic look before he eats his meager portion voraciously. Steve suspects that, were it possible, Tony would share his own food at the risk of starving himself, while Clint would hunch protectively over his, would fight to keep it for himself.

It all seems like it's boiling down to something horrible and basic, to pure survival, and much as the archer had pointed out weeks before--something is going to give, and none of them has any intention of it being him.

*******  
They take Tony out and when they bring him back he is still barefoot and dressed in the same blue hospital scrubs as the others, but has been allowed to wash up and shave.

"They wanted me to look nice for my auction video," he explains. "I offered to strut a little."

"Someone could make a tidy profit off you," Clint snarks, "buying you for what you're worth, then selling you for what you _think_ you're worth. It's really a shame they can't weigh ego and sell it by the pound."

Tony just rolls his eyes dramatically and strikes a pose, then his humor fades a little as he fiddles with the door lock. "I saw Pepper Potts' name on the list of potential bidders."

They are quiet a long time, before Clint offers in a choked voice, "Well...I hope she wins."

"They're looking for us," Steve promises. "They're working on a plan. Probably several plans at once."

*******  
"Mashed potatoes," Steve suggests.

"Mmmm." Clint makes an approving sound. "Real ones or the instant, flaky kind?"

"I'd happily eat the instant kind. Even sans milk, at this point."

Tony laughs. "You can have the real kind," he points out. "You can have whatever you want when you're dreaming."

"Whatever I want?" Steve muses. "Then I'll have my _grandmother's_ mashed potatoes. She made them best."

"You are the wisest man ever," Clint says seriously. "I was gonna say chocolate chip cookies, but I've decided I'd rather have an orange."

"Really?" Tony is amused. "I never thought I'd see the day when you'd pass up cookies for _fruit_."

"I'd cheerfully murder someone for an orange right now. I can just imagine that sweet vitamin C running through my veins, making me all healthy and shit." Even Steve can't help but chuckle at his wistful expression.

"All right." Tony holds up his fingers, counting off. "Here's what we've ended up with. So far we're having deep fried turkey, chicken and noodles, coffee, crab rangoon, that brown bread they sell at Moe's, a pumpkin pie each--"

"With real whipped cream," Steve interjects.

"--yes, thank you, Steve--with real whipped cream. Whole milk, two pizzas with the works, Tandoori chicken, mashed potatoes, an orange--"

"And a partridge in a pear tree!" Steve sings on impulse, waving his hands jazzily.

"You guys can have some of my chicken and noodles, but I'm not sharing that orange," Clint warns.

"We wouldn't dare to ask."

*******  
They pull out Clint and don't bring him back till the next morning, just as Steve and Tony are hurtling toward flat out panic. Konstantin holds Clint's arm and helps him walk back into his cell; moving stiffly as if all of his vertebrae have been fused together. Steve can't see much else outwardly wrong with him except for his hands, which are torn and bloodied at the knuckles, and bruises that run up and down his arms. He lays in his bed with his face to the wall and doesn't say anything for hours, no matter how much Tony tries to engage him.

"It's going to be okay," Tony says quietly. He looks up and sees Steve watching, then raises his voice as if to include him in the conversation. "We are gonna get out of here. Clint? You hear me? There's no problem that I can't build or think my way out of. Not _yet_ , at least. Just give me some time to work on it. I'll figure it out. You have to believe that. Do you? Do you believe me, Clint?"

*******  
As evening falls Tony gives up on comforting words.

"Clint," he warns, "talk to me. Clint. _Clint Barton_." There's no answer, and he frowns in frustration. "Okay, you are _scaring_ me now, and that makes me fucking angry. And I'm no Hulk; I'm something way worse. You're making this happen; you're forcing me to do something I _really_ don't want to do. Talk to me. Cliiiiint. This is your last chance, dickhead!"

"Tony," Steve sighs, but quiets when Stark shoots him a look that could melt stone.

"Alright, that's _it_." Tony throws his hands up dramatically. "Let the showtunes begin!"

He sings loudly, exhaustingly, for hours maybe, and he's either making up half of the words or movie musicals have grown lyrically filthy in recent years. When he starts to run out of material he repeats the most annoying ones. Steve wonders how Tony possibly has the stamina to keep this up when he's living on almost no calories per day.

"I've got chiiiiiiills, they're multiplyin'...and I'm losin' contro-o-ol!!" Tony sings, and his whole face brightens suddenly when Clint pulls the blanket over his head. "I can't remember the rest so....You're the one that I want! Ooh-hoo-hoo, honey! You're the one that I want!"

"Quiddit," comes a low voice.

Tony pumps his fist silently in triumph and moves as close as possible to Clint's cell, singing louder. "Ooh-hoo-hoo, honey! Ooh-hoo-hoo, honey!" He repeats the phrase nonstop in a high falsetto until Steve thinks his ears might bleed, until finally, _finally_ :

"Stop it, Tony, you _asshole_!" Clint pulls the blanket down just enough to glare angrily.

"No," Tony says matter of factly. "I won't, not _ever_."

Steve can't help but admire him, really. Relentlessly annoying Tony may be sometimes, but even that is for a purpose, and he's always been able to draw people out in a way Steve has never quite understood. Steve can weave an inspiring tale, can hold up hope like a beacon, but Tony can burrow past defenses and get into people's heads in just as many good ways as bad.

"What did they do to you?" Tony demands.

"Nothing."

"Is that so?" Tony mimics his dismissive tone. "Well, that's just great news. So get up. You've been sleeping all day, you freaking _sloth_. How about you get back to work on that door if you feel so wonderful, hmmm, Lazykins?"

"Fuck you!" Clint snarls back, and Steve decides this might be a good time to intervene.

"What happened?" he asks gently.

"They heard from SHIELD," Clint says finally, sitting up slowly, his breath catching every other word. Steve can't tell if he's in pain, trying to bite back some emotion, or both. He sounds exhausted, his endurance stretched too far, too thin. "They wouldn't pay. Not a surprise. But they showed me Fury's message; I guess they thought it would--I don't know--would hurt my _feelings_ or something." He laughs a little at the idea. "But it's good they did, because it was really a message for me. Fury used keywords...they are trying to find us, but aren't close yet. They don't know where we are."

"Okay," Steve says. "That just means we need to be even more proactive at getting ourselves out. That's _all_ it means. We can still hope for rescue, but we can't count on it."

Tony sighs, then turns his attention back to Clint. " _Then_ what happened?" 

"That was it."

"Liar. They hurt you. Tell me what happened."

"Fuck off."

"Cliiiiiiiiint. You know that I can _make_ you tell me." Tony rattles the bars meaningfully, hums a little.

"Please."

The defeat in his voice takes the wind right out of Tony's sails. "Okay," he says finally, his voice softer. "We don't need to know. But don't you _dare_ check out on us. You hear me? I'm not going to allow it. If you think the showtunes were bad, well, let me tell you--I can do a whole lot worse."

"I _hate_ you," Clint says unhappily.

Tony flashes his most winning smile. "I know you do."

*******  
The next morning they brainstorm, even though it's laughable, planning anything in this situation.

"Even if we do somehow bust out of here," Tony points out, frustrated, "there are literally miles of woodland surrounding us. They brought us here by helicopter because there isn't even a fucking _road_ , Cap. It's winter. We make it outside and we'll be no better off, because we'll be lost and freezing about fifteen minutes later."

"Just us," Clint says. He clears his throat and looks over at Steve, smiling a little crookedly. "The way I hear it, Captain America can't freeze to death."

"Haha," Steve says, but smiles back. Then it occurs to him. "I guess you guys didn't notice the house, then."

"What house? _Where_?" Tony asks suspiciously, and Clint shrugs carefully. "I saw a town to the south, didn't notice a house."

"When we were flying in, I could see pretty well, and there is forest all around before the nearest town, like you said. But there was also a house of some kind, or maybe just a cabin, in between. We could make our way there, regroup."

"We'd have a better chance trying to take on this entire facility," Tony argues. "Get a gun and set up Hawkeye with it, have him pick everyone off. Stay inside, take one of their phones, contact the team, go home, eat a sammich. Sounds good, huh? Clint? Could you take on an entire cadre of bad guys with Cap and I flanking you, providing knock out punches and well timed quips as needed?"

"Maybe," Clint says, then nods. "Probably. Yeah, if I had a gun I could."

"Good. I'm glad to hear that," Tony says seriously. "Now, is Master Barton planning on getting up today? Because this jailbreak is a three man operation, and I abhor deadweight."

Clint gives him a dark look but rises stiffly to his feet and shuffles to the cell door. He moves so slowly and with none of his usual feline grace; Steve can only guess at the ways they have hurt him. Clint puts his fingers around the door handle and starts to pull, only to stop abruptly with a wince, pulling his shoulders in protectively.

"Hawkeye. Look at me."

He does, his pained eyes meeting Steve's.

"I'm still betting that door breaks first."

"Yeah," Clint says with a sigh. "Alright."

*******  
There is no electricity and also no heat; as the weeks pass it grows colder and colder, especially at night. They cover themselves with their thin blankets and shiver through the dark hours.

"Let's forget this whole thing and get a hotel, guys," Tony suggests. "Thousand threadcount sheets, room service, jacuzzi full of hot water. Nice, huh? Of course, even a motel room would be preferable right now. The kind with carpet on the walls instead of the floor."

"Ooh, can we get one that has a bed that shakes when you put in q-q-quarters? I always wanted to get one of those, but C-C-Coulson said he didn't want it on the expense report." Clint's teeth are chattering audibly.

"We'll get one of those beds and five rolls of quarters and sleep in epileptic heaven, Tweetie."

"That sounds good. That sounds so good."

He sounds so forlorn that Tony immediately changes tack. "Tell me a bedtime story," he demands. "Something happy. We don't need anything depressing right now. You first, Steve."

"One day when I was a kid it was so hot--so hot that I could feel the sidewalks through my sneakers, so humid you could almost taste the air, had to work to breathe it in and out. It was if the sky was a giant water balloon, holding in the water and straining as it grew bigger and bigger, more and more stretched...until finally it burst. The rain came down in sheets, and the sidewalks and streets were steaming as they cooled. All us kids ran through the water; even the adults were dancing in it." Steve doesn't tell them it had felt exactly what he imagined heaven must feel like--a rush of cool relief after a long period of misery, of laughter springing to your lips after worrying too long.

"I can almost see it," Clint muses. "I c-c-can almost see a young Steve Rogers, happy in a rainstorm."

Steve smiles back, but suddenly feels like crying. "How about you?" he asks, relieved that his voice sounds normal.

Clint sighs, thinking. "One time in the circus, after a show...I sat with this townie girl behind the tents. We watched the stars and I brought her a red snow c-c-cone. Later she let me kiss her, and her lips tasted like sugar and strawberries."

"That's a sweet memory," Steve says approvingly.

"Yeah," Clint agrees. "How about _you_ , you lousy, unrelenting shithead?"

Tony snorts good naturedly. "Once upon a time I invited five homeless superheroes to come live in my tower, and I was never lonely again. The end."

"I like that story," Clint says.

Steve closes his eyes. "Me, too."

********  
They take Tony out and a few hours later there is shouting, gunfire. A guard rushes in to check that Clint and Steve are secured, glares at them threateningly, and leaves.

"Tony's escaped," Steve breathes, terrified and hopeful. "He's gotten away somehow." He isn't sure what he wants more; that Stark will flee the facility entirely and run for help, or that he will get a weapon somehow, come back for them, and that they will take on the place as a team. Either one works, really. Tony is free.

Clint curls his fingers around the bars of his door. "Come on, Stark," he whispers fervently. "Be the one that makes it."

********  
But they bring Tony back a few hours later, sweating and shaking in pain, his thighbone snapped.

*******  
They set Tony's leg in some sort of brace and give him painkillers. They do _that_ , at least.

It grows quiet then, because not only had Tony always been the glue between them, but Clint has also been steadily sliding toward silence this entire time, with Tony's constant verbal prodding keeping him engaged in a way Steve can't replicate. Now Tony spends most of the day sleeping or mumbling nonsense words. Clint has mostly given up on working on the door of his cell, instead sitting on his bed and watching Tony or Steve. Steve tries not to let the archer's staring bother him as he continues to work on the bars.

Between doses of medicine, Tony goes back to writhing uncomfortably but also is more coherent. "Was nothing," he mumbles, panting. "Nothing outside, and _cold,_ so cold."

"It's going to be okay," Steve tells him, but he doesn't really believe that anymore.

*******  
They bring him water and a razor and tell him to clean up, and Steve knows they are making their move at last, attempting to start a bidding war as they had done with Tony. He shaves and washes up as well as he can, wincing at his reflection in the mirror, all sharp cheekbones and hooded eyes. They want him to look like Captain America, but he doesn't. It's as if all of these years of strength had been a lie, as if the whole time his body has been just waiting to return to a lean frame, to frail health. This is his true natural state, the last few years just a clever fiction.

He looks exactly like Steve Rogers, but nothing like Captain America.

They don't bother threatening Tony because they still hope to sell him, and therefore he is too potentially valuable to be harmed, so they drag out Clint, who nobody will pay for. They cuff his wrists behind him and fix duct tape over his mouth, then position him in front of Steve's cell with a gun to his temple. They hand Steve a piece of paper and a guard tells him in halting English to read what it says, or Clint will be killed.

It's the only chance they've had to make contact with the outside world, their first real chance since Tony had managed to briefly escape. Steve tells himself that they won't really shoot Clint, that they would have done it already when SHIELD denied them. It goes against his moral center to gamble with another's life, but he has to try, has to try for all of their sakes.

Clint watches Steve, his normally expressive eyes now unreadable, and he'd like to think that his friend is silently urging him to go ahead, to do what needs to be done. Steve remembers the man pragmatically eating his own meager portion of food in front of a starving teammate and thinks that this is what the SHIELD agent would do, had he the same chance.

The guard holds up his phone, and as the live stream starts, Steve reads, "My name is Steven Rogers, and I am Captain America." He glances at Clint, who stares back, then goes off-script. "My team and I are being held hostage somewhere in Russia," he adds quickly, and flinches as the gun is raised and brought down to Clint's face with a loud crack. He wants call out for them to stop, but this is his best chance at getting a message out, and he presses on. "They flew us over the Lena River. There is a town to the south--" the gun hits his skull again and Clint grunts in pain "--we are held in some sort of abandoned jail in the middle of a expanse of forest."

"Enough!" the guard yells, then kicks Clint in the middle of his back, hitting whatever injury is hidden beneath his shirt, his scream bloodcurdling even muffled behind the duct tape. The guard snaps something in Russian and the recording is stopped, everyone yelling words Steve can't understand.

"I'm sorry!" Steve cries, but the words are wasted, because the archer is unconscious as they drag him out into the hallway, still yelling angrily. One of them returns. "What are you going to do with him? Wait, just wait a second!"

The guard shouts back angrily in Russian, then opens Tony's cell and throws the drugged man easily over his shoulder, and takes him away too.

*******  
Steve thought things were bad before, but being alone; that is the worst of all. His friends are both starving and injured, and now they are gone. There was nothing he could do for them, before, but when they were here he'd had eyes on them at least, could know that they were still alive. Now he doesn't even have that.

Something is happening. He can hear yelling, arguing, almost constantly, then the sounds of things being moved around in the hallways and rooms beyond this one. Eventually he realizes they are packing up. They're leaving.

His message must have worked, that or something else has spooked these men, made them doubt the remoteness of their location and their ability to keep their hostages hidden. Perhaps SHIELD or the other Avengers are drawing close. The only thing left is to see if they will attempt to move their prisoners elsewhere or just go ahead and kill them and be done with it. Things grow noisier as the activity increases then eerily silent as it empties.

It's the young guard, Konstantin, that comes in at last, carrying a liter jug of water, looking at Steve with guilty, sad eyes.

"Help," Steve asks simply, wishing so desperately in this moment that he knew any Russian at all--here he had lived with a Russian woman for years and still knows nothing of the language, and now that seems like the height of laziness on his part. "Please, Konstantin, _help_."

The man spreads his hands helplessly. "Sorry," he says in his thick accent. He hands Steve the water through the bars, saying something in Russian, something that sounds like a warning, an admonition.

Their captors aren't going to kill them. And they aren't going to move them. They are just leaving them behind, locked in cells, to either die or be rescued. From the anguished look on Konstantin's face, rescue doesn't look terribly likely.

"Let me out," Steve says. "I won't hurt you; just let me out. Please." He gestures at the key ring on the man's belt, points to the door lock. "Please. Help."

"Sorry," Konstantin says again. "Sorry, Captain. Sorry." He lays the keys on the desk on the opposite side of the room, where Steve has no hope of ever reaching them. Konstantin points down the hallway, where Steve assumes Clint and Tony are being held, and shrugs sadly. "Sorry." He shoves his hands into his pockets, and doesn't look at Steve anymore.

And then he is gone.

*******  
He kicks at the bar he's been working on since the beginning, kicks at it as hard as he can, until he is panting and exhausted, then rests as briefly as possible before returning to work. Because it is as he had feared all those weeks ago--everything has boiled down to pure survival and a ticking clock, to how long he and the others can go without water before they die in these cells. They can't count on rescue. Not anymore. He's pouring sweat and his leg muscles are screaming; he has starved too long for this much exertion. Steve keeps his mind focused on Tony and Clint and his eyes on the keys on the desk.

 _Clank_! Tony, his leg broken by their captors. He can't run again. _Clank_! And he won't get any more painkillers now that they have gone. _Clank_! Hopefully he isn't suffering too much, and Clint is caring for him. _Clank_!

Steve's feet are bleeding. A few of his toes are broken. It doesn't matter.

 _Clank_! Clint, bleeding and unconscious as they dragged him away. Hurt. Because of Steve. _Clank_!

Steve is gasping, his lungs burning. But he doesn't stop; he can keep going. He has to.

He's Captain America.

He's strong enough.

*******  
Two days later, maybe three, the bar breaks at last. Steve stares in surprise for long moments, because he hadn't expected it would happen. Not really.

Almost two months ago there would have been no way Steve Roger could have slipped through such a small opening, but starvation and dehydration are his allies in the end, and he fits through without much difficulty at all, blinking incredulously, and then is grabbing the keys, running and calling out for his friends.

*******  
He is relieved to find them together, laying on a dirty floor with their arms wrapped around one another. When they hear his footsteps their heads pop up, eyes wide, looking for all the world like a pair of overgrown children from a scary story--Hansel and Gretel, maybe, gazing up at the witch as she approached to tuck them away into her oven.

"Steve??" Clint gasps the word out and stands slowly. "Oh my God, is it really you?"

He doesn't look so bad, not as bad as Steve had feared he might. He is emaciated and hollow eyed and there are still dark bruises on his face where he had been struck, but otherwise appears relatively undamaged.

Tony, on the other hand, looks terrible. Also gaunt, and pale, frighteningly so, barely able to focus his eyes on Steve. "Who's that?" he asks blearily. "Is it that Jehovah's Witness again?"

It might be a joke, but the man is so hazy it's hard to tell. "No, it's Steve," Clint answers, and laughs in weak relief when Steve produces the key ring and opens their cell door easily. They stumble into a clumsy, desperate hug. "Thank God. Thank God you're here. I was afraid they had killed you. I was sure we were gonna die, too."

"No. We're going to be okay. We've got to find something to drink, then we're going to figure a way to get home. How's that sound?"

"Good. So good." Clint's expression goes a little wild around the edges at the mention of water. "Whatever we do, we have to hurry." He cocks his head, indicating Tony. "He's sick. Pneumonia, I think. I can't get him up enough, get him upright and moving around enough that he can cough it out. He needs a doctor."

"We'll get him one."

There's no running water any more than there is electricity, but Steve finds a well and handpump outdoors that serves just fine. He fills the containers that had been left in their cells and brings them back to Tony and Clint, who struggle to drink slowly.

"There's more where this came from," Steve reassures them. "All that we need. Just go easy." It is difficult to follow his own advice, his body greedy, wanting to gulp. Tony smiles sickly.

"You look like shit, Steve," he observes, then holds up a silencing hand. "And before you say it, I do not, so shut your mouth. I look a _mazing_ , like always." Then he frowns, rolls up onto his elbow and coughs, rattling deep in his chest. "Ugh. Hey. Hey, Clint. What day is it?"

"It's Tuesday," Clint answers confidently, patting his back carefully as Tony coughs again, and Steve is surprised. He'd lost count of the days ages ago, and is more than a little impressed that Hawkeye was somehow able to keep track of them.

"We need to go through this place, see if there is anything to salvage, and then we make our way south, to that town," Steve tells them, talking mostly to Clint, Tony having gone a little glassy eyed.

"We have no coats--hell, we don't even have any _shoes_. Tony didn't make it very far when he got out. We'll freeze to death."

"We'll freeze in _here_ , eventually, and we should leave before any of those jerks decide to come back. If our team shows, they'll see that we were here, and it will be nothing for them to find us if we're on foot. But we can't assume that they'll come. We can't count on it."

*******  
They stay there through the night, all wrapped up around one another, a little warmer for once, if not entirely comfortable. The next morning Clint and Steve comb through the building, finding little of use beyond their four thin blankets and the water jugs that had been left for them. They move as quickly as they can, not wanting to waste a precious moment of sunlight, and Steve is concerned when he finds Clint sitting back in their old cell, hunched over and gasping for breath.

"What's wrong, what happened??"

"Nothing," he pants, pale and with a blue tinge to his lips. "I just...I'm just tired is all."

Steve puts a hand on his back and immediately pulls it away as if burned, alarmed by the jackhammering of the heart beneath his fingers. Maybe Barton is sick, like Tony, but Steve suspects it's actually two months of starvation catching up with the man, his weakened system crumbling at last. "Oh no," he whispers, and Clint glares at him.

"I'll be okay," he says crossly. "Just give me a second. I'm no supersoldier, but I suppose I'll make it, nonetheless." His eyes dare Steve to disagree.

*******  
Clint tears one of their precious blankets into strips and then wraps pieces around his feet like bandages, then carefully does the same for Tony.

"Good idea," Steve says approvingly, taking his own strips when offered.

"Who knows, maybe we'll get to keep a few of our toes in the end," Clint says with an echo of his old carefree grin.

"I'll build you special robo-toes," Tony offers, trying not to wince as they wrap him up and Steve lifts him as gently as possible, careful not to jostle his splinted leg. "Hey, what day is it?"

"It's Tuesday," Clint lies easily, and Steve's chest feels tight as he realizes that Clint has probably been answering that question the same way repeatedly these last days.

"Why do you ask, Tony?" he asks. It's probably just the fever talking, but he's curious why it would even matter to Tony now what day it is.

"I was gonna bring Pepper flowers on our anniversary. It's on Friday. I'm hoping we make it back in time, or...no flowers."

"I think she'll forgive you."

"I'm sure she will," Tony agrees quietly. "But if it's only Tuesday, we're okay. We still have time. It's just...I don't want to miss it. We've been away so long already." He sighs. "I wonder what else we're gonna miss."

*******  
He and Clint walk, the blankets pulled around their shoulders offering only token protection from the cold. Tony is not much more than a pile of bones in his arms, but already Steve's back is aching, the muscles in his arms burning. It seems so long ago now that he had been strong, could have carried Tony easily, could have run with him if needed. But now he moves slowly and Clint moves even slower, plodding forward resolutely, his head down, watching the ground, as if looking ahead is just too daunting. He doesn't take care to avoid rocks like he should, and his feet are already bleeding.

Tony starts coughing so violently that Steve is afraid he'll drop him and further injure his leg, so he calls for a break.

"That sounds good," Tony answers, his voice faraway. "Could we make a fire or something?"

Clint knows how to start one without matches, but he's too shaky and his fingers too stiff to do very much. Steve finally stops his clumsy endeavors and just pulls them both close on either side of him as he leans against the tree, holding them as tightly as he can. He can feel their ribs, their spines, beneath his hands. Clint is shivering so violently that the movement jostles the others; Tony isn't shaking half as hard, and Steve is not sure if that is better or worse.

"How much farther do we have to go?" Clint mumbles and Steve sighs. It's miles yet, and at the pace they are going they won't be there any time soon.

"It's pretty far," Steve admits and Tony groans. "But don't forget about the little house, the cabin. Remember? It's right between the town and the jail, and we can make it there. We _can_." He looks down at Tony, who blinks blearily back. "We'll rest at the cabin awhile, then make our way to the town. And then...home."

"Home," Tony repeats wistfully.

"Yeah. What's the first thing you're going to do when we get there?"

"I'm going to cut off my feet and put them in the fireplace," Tony says dreamily and Clint doesn't answer at all, fast asleep despite his shivering.

"Hold on, guys," Steve whispers. "Just hold on, okay?"

*******  
Steve awakens an hour or two later when he hears Clint mumbling "What's the question? It's _you_." into the side of his chest.

"Hey," Steve rasps and clears his throat. Clint raises his head, blinking in confusion, trying to focus his eyes on the landscape, on Steve. "You awake? Do you think you can get up, get moving again?"

"Huh?" Clint looks around and visibly deflates when he sees that they are still here, that whatever he was dreaming was not reality. "Oh," he says. "Oh." He struggles to sit up away from Steve, his balance poor, shivering hard as soon as the blanket falls from his shoulders and the air hits his skin. "Oh," he says again.

Steve wakes up Tony and makes him drink some water, hooking the now empty container back onto the makeshift belt Clint had tied around his waist, made from the same blanket as their foot wrappings. "What are we doing here, Steve?" Tony asks, disoriented. "Where are we going?"

"We're going home," Steve tells him, ignoring Clint's hollow, listless laugh.

"Oh thank God." Tony smiles, his face pale except high on his cheeks, which are flushed with fever. "Hey, you happen to know what day it is?"

"It's Tuesday."

*******  
They walk again. Only yesterday they had been locked in those cells to die, but now walking seems to have already encompassed Steve's entire world, as if he has been doing this forever, will be walking for the entirety of his life. He tries to shake such thoughts away and steel himself, gripping Tony more securely to him, hoping that their closeness will help protect him. Already Steve's thoughts are disorganized from fatigue and hunger, but the cold is adding an edge of hysteria to everything that is frightening.

Clint stumbles more and more, as if drunk, completely uncoordinated for the first time in these years that Steve has known him. Clint has always been so strong; Steve had even seen him once run in battle with a knife in his kneecap--just stuck right there in the bone, bobbing back and forth as he continued to sprint, amped up on determination and endorphins. Now he is the opposite of all that focused, deadly grace; moving stiffly and painfully due to already frostbitten feet, beyond exhaustion. He does better when he grips Steve's elbow, but that not only makes them move even slower--and they are already moving so slowly, dear God--but also constantly threatens Steve's balance, already precarious with Tony in his arms.

They've maybe walked a few hours before Clint stumbles, going to his knees and just staying there. Steve turns back. "Come on. You can do it."

"I can't. I honestly  _can't_." He shakes his head in disbelief, incredulous that for the first time his stubborn perseverance is not enough to move him forward. "Oh God." His eyes meet Steve's, and he looks scared. Actually scared. "Steve...we're gonna die out here."

"No, we aren't," Steve says firmly, setting Tony down carefully against a tree and going over to Clint. "You're just too cold, just too tired. That's all." He rubs his hands over Clint's arms, which feel like ice even through the blanket, then carefully lays a palm on his chest, where he can feel the man's heart pounding dangerously. "We'll rest for awhile, huh? How does that sound?"

Clint makes a noncommittal noise, still wide eyed, but Steve nods decisively. It's getting dark anyway, and he's afraid they'll lose their direction without the light.

Steve spreads a blanket beneath them and then tucks the remaining two on top of them, all packed together like sardines. He makes sure to cover their feet, and the other two men are mostly covered to their shoulders, but he is so much taller that much of his upper body is still exposed. It doesn't matter. He draws them in close again, trying to will his body to warm theirs.

"Where's....cabin?" Clint asks, and for a moment it doesn't even sound like English, but Steve finally puzzles it out.

"Close, it's got to be so close now, just keep holding on till we get there."

"I'll find a way. Hell, I'll _build_ my way out," Tony murmurs confidently, and Steve can't imagine how terrible he must feel, with a broken leg and pneumonia, burning up with fever while slowly dying of hypothermia at the same time.

He wishes now that they had stayed in the jail, because they might have starved, but at least they would have been somewhat more protected from the elements. But what choice had there been? Die there, or die here?

They'd had to try.

*******  
That night Steve dreams disjointedly of being found--of the quinjet appearing with Howard Stark at the controls, of Bruce and Bucky, who have joined together for the rescue mission, wrapping them all in blankets and giving them warm drinks. Steve leans his head against his best friend's shoulder and watches Clint embrace Natasha, telling an embellished account of how they all almost died--again--as she clucks her tongue. Watches Tony do the same with his father, who is somehow as young as his son, their dark heads pressing against one another.

It's such a good dream that when he wakes up from it the pain is almost physical.

*******  
They walk.

*******  
Clint slumps down against a tree, knees against his chest, and looks at his hands. He stares at the palms, then turns them over to look at the backs, as if he'd never really examined his own hands before. They are white as bone, pale blue at the fingers.

"Come on, get up, we have to keep moving."

"No."

Steve sighs, and hopes he sounds encouraging instead of exhausted, afraid. "Let's _go_ , Hawkeye."

"No," Clint says again. He sounds more clear headed than he has been since they left the jail. "I'm not walking anymore. I'm going to stay here."

Steve sets Tony down gently, tucking the blanket around him as best as he can. "Clint, please, come on. I can't carry you both. I would, please--I _would_ if I could."

"I don't want you to. I want you to help Tony. But...I'm not walking anymore. Just...not."

"And I won't leave you here. Please get up. Just hold onto me, lean on me a little more. I'll help you."

"I'm outside," Clint says, his eyes bright but his words slow and slurred. He gestures with his arm to the world around him, smiles peacefully. "That's more than I ever hoped I would get; that I would get to die outside...with my face to the sky."

"We can go slower. It's just the cold, Clint; you're not thinking clearly."

"I _am_ , though." His smile dims a little, thoughts passing over his face like thunderclouds, one second seeming more confused, and the next a little more himself. "I'm sorry, Steve...I tried...but..." Clint gives a short, melancholy laugh, "...I guess that door was stronger after all."

"No." Somehow he'll just have to carry them both, because he cannot, will not, leave Clint behind. Steve moves toward him, but a frail arm presses across his legs to block him.

"Leave him be, Steve," Tony says, resigned. "Let him stay here, if that's what he wants." Clint nods and reaches out to Tony, who chokes back a sob and tries takes his hand, their fingers both too frozen to curl around each other.

"Tony? Hey, Tony. Remember my story--about the girl with the snow cone?"

"Yeah."

"I'm going wait here and see if she shows up. You never know. She just might. I'm going to wait here and see." His eyes look both clear and far away, as if he is dreaming awake.

"Okay," Tony says. "Okay." He leans heavily against Steve, who, shaking from more than just the cold, hefts him with difficulty. "I'll see you around, Clint Barton."

"Maybe you will." Clint rests his head back against the tree and smiles, closing his eyes as they walk away. "Goodbye, guys. Goodbye."

*******  
He walks.

*******  
It isn't much later when Steve has to stop, so weak that he's sure he'll drop Tony if he goes any further. He can't carry Tony anymore, and he can't go on without him. It's just...over. Just like that. Just like it had been for Clint.

"....Tony?"

"Yeah?"

"I never saw--" Steve swallows hard. "There never _was_ a little cabin."

"Oh." He chuckles ruefully. "Well...I guess I actually knew that all along.

"I wanted to give you guys something to move toward, something to hope for. I didn't want you to give up, like Clint. Because he didn't mean to, he never would have, if he had been himself. I wasn't strong enough to carry you both, and I also wasn't strong enough to keep him going on his own."

"It's okay. It's all going to be okay." Tony coughs shallowly, closing his eyes, unable to keep them open any longer. "Do you believe me, Steve?

He doesn't, but he can't say that. Not to Tony. "We should have stayed with Clint," Steve says. "We could have been together at least. He wouldn't have been alone at the end."

"Maybe he wasn't. Maybe that girl came along after all, and they are sitting together right now, eating red snow cones. Maybe he'll lean in, steal another kiss."

"I'm sorry," Steve says finally. "I'm sorry, Tony. I'm sorry I couldn't get you guys out. I tried. Please, God, I tried."

"Don't worry, Cap. I'll build an Iron Man suit and fly us home," Tony says remotely, still not opening his eyes. "I'll find the parts somewhere. My dad can help us, if he's not too busy. I can build anything, did you know that?" He burrows more tightly toward Steve.

"I _do_ know that."

"I have so many ideas." Tony's words are so slow they are barely understandable. Probably because he's so tired. He's just too tired to stay awake, Steve thinks, that's all it is. "Just wait till I show you. I have so...much...that I want...to show you all."

*******  
Steve isn't sure out of what happens next which is the dream and which is reality, or if _none_ of it is, or all of it.

He hears the jet overhead, feels Tony being moved away from him, strong arms lifting him as well. A deep voice that might be Thor's, an answering one that might be Bruce. Or they might be only in his head, because his eyes won't open.

But then they do open, and Steve can't help but laugh when he sees it, because there _is_ a cabin, after all.

There's smoke coming from the chimney, and he thinks that Clint found must have gone ahead to find it, gotten the fire going. And that means that this must be the dream, because Clint is surely dead by now, but Steve wants it to be real, wants them all to be together, wants to have found a safe, warm place in the middle of this long nightmare.

There are hands all over him, moving him this way and that, people speaking too loudly, someone crying. Steve thinks dimly that he hears Tony, asking what day it is.

And then he is walking with Tony, heading toward that cabin. Clint must hear Steve's footsteps crunching in the snow because he comes out onto the porch, hand extended to help them up the steps, smiling the way that friends do when loved ones have finally come calling.

He wants to make it up those stairs, to take his friend's hand. He tries to sit up and immediately hands push him back down. He tries again, makes it to his feet despite grabbing hands, despite raised voices.

He can go a little farther still.

He's Captain America.

He's strong enough.

*******  
He wakes up to Natasha's frown, and the light shining behind her head makes her hair appear a fiery halo.

"Stop freezing yourself to death, Steven Rogers," she scolds gently.

He can't say anything back, still too weak, his body unresponsive. Everything hurts and that's probably a good sign. He wants to ask about Tony. Wants to ask if they found Clint.

She lays her hand on his cheek. She smiling, so maybe there's good news. She wouldn't be smiling like that otherwise. "Just rest," she tells him. "It's all going to be alright. We're going home."

**Author's Note:**

> This is the last real story I have to offer. There's one other that's about half done, but it's coming along terribly and will probably amount to nothing. So if this is the end, thank you so much for reading, and for all the encouragement along the way! :)


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